Excellent conditions on the newly-expanded snowmaking loop - nearly 5K! The Green Meadow loop is a nice addition to the course, giving a little bit of a break from all the hills. Put on the coldest wax you have and dress in layers, and you'll be great out there.

(Bill Oyler)

We opened the rest of the Green Meadow Loop this afternoon to up our total to 4.75k on the snowmaking trail. We will be pushing snow out in the lower stadium early this week in order to open it up before this coming weekend's events Pre-Loppet and Loppet Invite.

Photos:

(Isaac Kasper, Loppet Foundation)

I skated and my son classiced on impeccably groomed squeaky-slow -5F snow on the main loops. My main achievement was talking 2 women from Miami, wearing jeans and light parkas, out of renting skis and heading out in -6F darkness at 5:30 pm to introduce themselves to our lovely sport.

(David Moore)

Wirth is back! We're still a long ways from the days when mother nature allowed entire seasons to be skied in Eloise Butler and the Bog but the stated 3.5k of snowmaking trails are fantastic and I love the new route. Snow is terribly slow due to flurries and continuing snow making and on that front they are going great guns! It's going to be fantastic once they open Twin Lake. Now if we could just do something about that traffic light on 55...

(Joe Dolan)

Snowmaking Trails: We have a total of 3.5k of snowmaking trails groomed for classic and skate. This includes LaSquadra, Ridgeline, Trail 18 and the east half of Green Meadow Loop with the turnaround outside the lower stadium.
North Wirth Natural Snow Trails: We have about 8.4k of natural snow trails groomed for skate only. We will be out today grooming/packing these trails as it snows. We will need at least 2 inches in order for us to groom classic tracks. The groomed trails are: Judy, Bridge Trail, Skyline, Tornado Alley and JD Rivers. Rock skis recommended for natural snow trails. See North Wirth map for information on these trails.
Note: We ran into some groomer scheduling issues over the holiday weekend so skiing conditions were not what people have come to expect. We apologize for that and will continue working to improve or processes.

Photos:

(Isaac Kasper, Loppet Foundation)

This report is for the Judy Lutter section (2.4 km) of the Wirth trail system. Snow is not made here, but it was open for skiing anyway. Don't bring good skis, as there were a lot of leaves, some sticks, and a couple of really thin snow sections with grass patches poking through. It was also a little icy which made some of the downhills exciting. Basically, it's really fun right now if you want to poke around, have a little adventure and get away from the crowds, and can handle some adverse conditions. The rest of the open trails at Wirth, with human-made snow, were quite nice for classic skiing today.

(William Daniels)

We have a total of 3.5k of snowmaking trails groomed late last night for classic and skate. This includes La Squadra, Ridgeline, Trail 18 and the east half of Green Meadow Loop with the turnaround outside the lower stadium.
This week we are making snow on the west half the of the Green Meadow Loop (the east half of what was called Twin Lake Trail which includes using the cutoff to the north out of the meadow). We will be finished making snow on this loop soon and with it connected outside the lower stadium we will be up to about 4.75k.

(Isaac Kasper, Loppet Foundation)

Good conditions for classical at Wirth this afternoon. The Piston Bully had just come out as we left at 3:30pm and was tilling up the skate deck, so that should improve the icy conditions. The Piston bully had wiped out the classic track in a couple of spots, so I assume they are maybe going to reset the classic tracks.

(Keith Gilbert)

99% really good classic skiing on the man made loop. 1% traversing across ice to get to the next really good spot. Classic skiing with Oslo green was just right. Tracks are hard packed. Control was good enough, but there are three spots where a person has to have a plan. I'll go in order of occurrence, starting from the bottom of the sledding hill.
1. First right hand corner into Trail 18, behind the cooling tower. Because this is off-camber, and there are a couple bumps on the inside, only the outside six feet or so aren't icy and washed out. If you start in the middle, you will probably end up on the outside anyways. So take the outside line and it's fine. This corner could use some snowscaping (banking) and grooming TLC. It really shouldn't be the technical feature that it has become.
2. Left hand downhill corner on the new Ridgeline segment. It's icy and washed out on the uphill portion in the middle but good on the outside. Stay outside and you'll have a nice time. This corner is banked nicely, so it flows real well.
3. Entry into the La Squadra downhill (sledding hill). This one is really hard packed from the top to just before the right hand corner. If you just plan to shoot straight into the corner on the outside line and turn once you get past the trees, it's not bad. Almost all the icy part is before the actual corner.

(Adam Himes)

This morning it looks like some light grooming implement was dragged a few times around the course with a snowmobile. It had no discernible effect on the rock hard boilerplate that was there last night. Hopefully they will have time to till it with the snow cat at some point. Not worth skiing for me based on my experience last night. On the other hand they are making some fantastically large piles of fake snow on the old par 3 course.

(Zach Handler)